Old Levee taught me to weep and moan
by Sidura
Summary: AU from After the Leeve Breaks. Dean makes the ultimate sacrifice to battle Lucifer and save his brother,but that doesn't mean the end of the consequences of the choices that were made that fateful night when Sam open the door to the devil himself.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer - own nothing and no-one.

Slightly AU from from after 'When the Leeve breaks'. (okay majorly alternate - as thought this up before I saw the finale)

Thanks for mayalean for looking at it - any mistakes you find are from me tinkering after she did her thing.

Hope people enjoy it.

* * *

It had been ten months. Ten months since he escaped their "special intervention." Ten months since he had found her and drank so much demon blood that he had finally become something else. Ten months since his brother had witnessed what he had become, and it had been ten months since Dean had shut the door on Bobby's panic room on him for a second time, leaving him only Bobby's voice on the other side of the door for company.

Ten months since Sam's plan to make sure that no demon, starting with Lilith, but ending with himself and Ruby, made it out, had gone awry. Ten months since Ruby's true motives became clear, ten months since the spilling of Lilith's life blood by his hand had broken the final seal, ten months since Lucifer rose copying Sam's own form, ten months since Sam's actions had forced his brother to willingly become something else, to become the only thing to stand in Satan's way. Ten months since he had been brought to this place battered and broken for Bobby to tend to his wounds while the being that once had been his brother performed that task that he had believed should be his.

Ten months – it was hard to believe that much time had passed; all the while there he was, stuck in that small room.

He had been so angry that he, who had been so strong and powerful, he who had snapped Lilith in two without breaking a sweat, was tucked up safe and sound as he healed from the wounds that Lucifer had inflicted on him as punishment for trying to fight back, for not obeying the throbbing blood in his veins automatically, when his new master called.

He who had effectively replaced Lilith as Lucifer's first real triumph, the corrupted human soul, the true living demon, locked away in a small room as all the action went down.

Ten months and the only anchor he had was Bobby's apologies of why he couldn't open the door as he pounded the iron walls until his hands bled, walls that had made his skin burn as he refused to beg to be let out even though all he wanted was to make amends for the sins he had committed while he thought his way had been the only way. A path he had taken because he thought that with her help, he'd be the only one who would be able to do what was needed, that this was the only way to make something good come out of the curse that had destroyed his family's lives, to pay them back for all the sacrifices they had to make because of what had been done to him.

Though forty days after the door had been closed, he stopped beating the walls. Forty days after he had been stuck in that little room the ground started to quake and the skies darken as the rest of creation held its breath. Three hours after the birds started to sing again, Bobby had opened the slot and simply said, "It's done, son, and they got her, too."

"Where is he, Bobby!" he yelled. "Where is he?"

"I don't know. It was Cas that brought the message," Bobby admitted. "He just wanted to keep you and me out of it, boy. But now you should get away from the door."

"Why the hell should I?" he spat out in anger as his veins pulsed with the power he had taken as again he fruitlessly tried to pass the demon-proof barriers of the panic room.

How he went from that to being out cold on the floor, he will never be sure. The light, the pain, the emptiness of the moment after he came to as he became something different, something he hadn't been since he had been six months old.

"Sam?" Bobby asked from his position behind the door, staring intently until he stirred.

"You're going to stay in there. I don't know for how long. Just until you got the cravings under control," Bobby said. "He asked for that poison to be stripped out of your system, but your head is going to be telling you that you want it for a long while."

"Bobby, please…," he cried from the middle of his little cell. "Please tell me where he is. Where's Dean?"

Bobby sighed, "I don't know, son. I honest to God don't know."

He didn't know what was worse – the real withdrawal or the psychological one. He still saw Alistair and Lilith grinning down at him, his mother's crying, his father's utter disappointment and Jess's utter bewilderment while asking him why, why had he been so blind. All of the voices continually telling him how he had been played into becoming something else, into betraying his family and all they held dear and for what? Revenge? To prevent the apocalypse? To get justice? Or was it so a demon wrapped up in a cute little package would stroke his ego, open a vein and spread her legs for him on a regular basis?

Sure, when he first wound up in her embrace, it was because he wanted to cling onto anything that made him feel a little less empty, to find comfort in someone who wouldn't leave, who couldn't die on him, who wouldn't make some stupid sacrificial gesture saying they were doing it for him, but after Dean had come back? He had continued to drink her blood to get strong enough, to continue the process that the Yellow Eyed Demon had started years before, sure at the time he had believed it was the only way to get pay back for all the pain Lilith had caused, to stop her breaking the seals but to become Ruby's bitch every time she opened a vein for him though sometimes she hadn't needed to bleed for him to crawl into her bed – if they made to the bed.

He had thrown his relationship with his brother away for that? For a demon he had known he couldn't really trust in the first place, a demon that he must have known had a hidden agenda. Thinking on it now he couldn't think why he had done it, why he had listened to her, had he really trusted her or was it because some small part of him had thought that he could actually play her rather than the other way around, that he could have kept control of the situation – yeah right, like he could make that one fly.

Had he really believed that his brother hadn't been strong enough to do what had been required. Had he really listened to Ruby's words of how Dean would eventually understand and how it would all turn out all right as the blood ran free, as she wrapped her legs around him as he felt the energy of the blood he had drank throb inside him. Boy, had he been wrong.

It had only ended because his brother had done what he had always done and stepped up to the plate when the time called and had not cared about the cost. His brother had sacrificed it all, his life, his hopes, and in the end his humanity, while he had gotten his kicks tearing Lilith limb from limb thinking that he had prevented the apocalypse, not noticing Ruby's reaction of glee as the last seal opened in that room and Lucifer himself rose while wearing a damn near identical copy of the meat suit that housed the now damned soul of Samuel Winchester until it was too late.

Sure he had tried to fight back. He'd winged Ruby as she moved to Lucifer's side, taken out a couple of the others that had risen with the devil himself as she called for him to join them, but he hadn't seen the whole truth until it was too late, of what the choices that she had given him had lead to. That he wasn't the only one keeping things secrets, although in his heart he knew what she had been up to all along, to free Lucifer himself, by ensuring Lilith was killed by the right hand, the hand of the one that was to replace Lilith as Lucifer's corrupted soul.

Had that been Azazel's plan all along when he had first tainted Sam? To create a special "child" that was strong enough to kill Lilith, to break the final seal? To twist a human soul in a similar fashion as Lucifer had twisted hers all those millennia ago? To make Sam become the Omega to the Alpha of Dean's Righteous Man?

Then, just as Sam had weakened to the point where he had started to beg for it all to end, as Lucifer mocked how he had only lasted meer moments compared to the decades it had taken for his brother to ask to be taken off of the rack, Dean had appeared in a ball of light and calm, the ground shaking with each step he took, swinging the sword of Michael with such surety it was as if he had been armed with it since the dawn of time.

Had the angels known that this was going to happen from the beginning? What he and Dean would become? Had they been watching his family as all of this counted down? Had they sat and waited instead of preventing it? Could they have stopped it at any time? They could have taken him before Ruby had gotten to him, prevented Dean's deal, got to Yellow eyes before Dean had put a bullet in his brain. They could have stopped it all from going down.

Had they instead decided to watch it all unfurl, while they polished their burning swords waiting for the day when the Winchester boys would become the opposite ends of the spectrum?

Had they decided that his and Dean's lives were the prefect excuse for the ultimate cosmic rematch?

Had his mother any idea of it when she as she tucked his brother into bed at night, as she told Dean that "angels are watching over you." All the while had she waited for Yellow Eyes to make good on his deal by taking her second son? He knew where Lucifer had been in all that time, but where the hell was God during all of this?

The irony of it was that Azazel hadn't needed to feed blood to Sam as a baby to prepare him. The demon could have just waited and he would have seen Sam lap it up willingly. For it seemed, for all Sam's mocking of his brother over the years and even with all the other bullshit on top it; that it was the youngest Winchester that could be led around by his dick, even though at the time he had justified as keeping her on side to make sure her blood was on tap while she supposedly searched for Lilith. Because after all that time sitting in that room with nothing to do apart from think, all Sam could conclude was he honestly could not say things wouldn't have worked out very differently if Ruby had turned up in his life wearing the skin of a greasy biker named Larry.

Ten months had passed since then. It had been eight months and twenty days since… the angels or God himself had purged his system of the poison in his veins, and it had been fifty minutes since Bobby had opened the door to finally let him out.

"What's been happening…you know since?" Sam asked as he came down to breakfast after having a long overdue shower and shave. Ten months of using a basin was more than long enough.

Bobby shrugged as he started to make lunch. "Don't know."

"What do you mean?"

"What do you expect me to say?" Bobby asked, "World didn't end and I been here with you. As for anything else, not much to say."

"Right," Sam said as he bowed his head in shame.

"I ain't heard from him, son," Bobby sadly admitted. "Not one word. Not even sure he made it out alive or as alive as he would be now."

Sam nodded as he understood what Bobby meant; because his brother had refused to put a bullet in him before the seal had broken, because Dean had refused to go down the Cain and Abel route, not that Sam wouldn't have thought Dean wouldn't have been justified at that point. Heaven had only one choice – to change Dean's fate – to give him the same one as Enoch's – to make Dean an Angel, more magnificent and terrifying than anything that Sam had witnessed before.

It had been days after the purging that he had finally begun to understand Bobby's words that the only way for Heaven to win after the breaking of the last seal was for the Righteous Man who broke the first to put aside earthly things and lead the battle as one of the ranks of the archangels themselves.

Sam had screamed so hard that day. The embarrassment of being thrown in that room, of being played so badly, not to mention the anger he felt that while he had prayed so hard all those years as his brother had festered against the faith, it was Dean that had joined the armies of Heaven while Sam had sunk to levels that he would never have thought he would ever reach. And while Dean had conversed with the messengers of Heaven, Sam had opened the gates of hell itself.

It hadn't been until after his anger at his brother had subsided that Sam had begun to really understand the last part of what Bobby had told him about what really had happened.

Dean had done a deal, another one, as he hadn't trusted those winged bastards as far as he could throw them without a contract – told Castiel that he would only surrender to the word of God under certain conditions – he wouldn't stand in the Angels' way. In fact, if Sam came before him during the battle, he would do the deed himself this time, but if Dean could stop his brother participating in the final fight, keep Lucifer's potentially greatest weapon out of the battle, then they would wipe Sam's slate clean, prevent him becoming a seal as Lilith had been. That if Dean helped them to win that they would let Sam live the rest of his life free of the demon blood in his veins.

His brother had given himself up to servitude to allow him to live out the rest of his mortal existence as a normal human.

Yet again Dean had saved Sam's ass by putting his own on the line. Not to mention the whole of the world. Typical Dean; act first and damn how everybody else is going to feel after it is all done.

Things from then on were strained. Sam not sure if Bobby blamed him for what had happened or if he was still in mourning for the man that had left a huge gapping hole in both his and Sam's hearts.

Sam tried to make himself useful around the yard – though there had been only so many tires a man could carry until he finally picks up a socket wrench and learns how to strip an engine. It hadn't been out of some need to connect with Bobby or even a need to create rather than destroy.

Hell, it hadn't been through a need to feel close in some small way with his brother or his dad that had caused him to finally learn how to rebuild what had remained of the Impala, which had been more or less destroyed in the confrontation with Lilith – hunting had simply lost its appeal, he couldn't bring himself to hit the road – not without Dean. Not that there had been much to hunt. Demonic omens had dwindled since the averted apocalypse like they had crawled into a corner to lick their wounds.

"I can see you are focusing your efforts on new activities," Castiel said as he watched Sam bent over the block.

Sam slowly straightened, grabbing hold of a rag to wipe his hands as he turned around.

"Is this it?" Sam asked. "You here to take me to where you take guys like me, guys who let Lucifer out of his cage?"

Castiel cocked his head to the side, "No. I am not here to inflict your punishment."

"Then what?" Sam asked. "I listened to Ruby, lied to my family, and brought the world to the edge, and it wasn't like I didn't know what was on the line. Are you saying that I get away scot free?"

Castiel stood there silently for a few moments. "It was what he wanted, and Ruby has been dealt with."

Sam took a second, "What happened to her? Did Dean…?"

"She will not return," Castiel stated coldly.

Sam bit his lip. "Can you tell me if he is alive? Is he okay?"

Castiel didn't answer.

"Talk to me, please. Tell me he is still alive."

"It is noticeable that you requested Ruby's status before your brother's," Castiel replied matter of factly.

"What do you want me to say or do?" Sam asked. "Can you take a message to him?"

"To what end?"

"To what end?" Sam asked in disbelief. "To tell him that I miss him that I'm sorry that I need him."

"I cannot do that. It would not be the best thing for him."

"Who says that you get to decide what is best for him!" Sam yelled.

"As you decided that your brother was not capable when you returned to the path you had began to travel with Ruby when he paid the price he had promised if hell returned you to life? Or when your father decided that your brother should put his hopes and dreams aside while he followed his cause?" Castiel asked. "You made your choice, Sam. You were told that using your abilities was a dark path. You were told that, if you walked away from him, not to come back to him. You should accept the consequences of your actions."

Sam looked away ashamed. "At least tell me that he survived."

"He did," Castiel replied. "He fulfilled his duty as it had been written."

"Is he… on Earth?" Sam asked

"I cannot tell you that," Castiel admitted.

"Why not?"

"I do it to protect him," Castiel said firmly.

"Can you tell me?" Bobby asked as he appeared behind them.

"No, Bobby Singer," Castiel said as Bobby took off his cap and began to wring it in his hands.

"Please…," Bobby muttered quietly. "I know he brought Sam here as much to dry him out as to make sure I wouldn't get involved, but please can you let me know he is all right."

Castiel sighed.

"I know I'm just an old man who ain't good for much these days," Bobby started to say. "But Dean… I love that a boy as if he had been my own. Is there anyway you can let me know if he is okay. I won't ask anything else as long as I know that."

Castiel nodded, taking a step forward and putting a hand on Bobby's shoulder. "Of course."

A second later Sam found himself alone in the yard.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Just the usual.

A/N I was planning on putting this up last night, but unfortunately real life got in the way - so sorry about that.

A/N I know this isn't a really exciting chapter but hopefully it will explain where Dean has been and part of the reason he hasn't gotten in touch with his brother, sorry it isn't fire and brimstone and has very little Sam (and Dean) in this bit actually.

Thanks to Mayalaen for looking at this for me - again any mistakes in it are due to my tinkering after I got it back and I suppose I should also thank Rospberry who told me to post this.

* * *

"Where are we?" Bobby asked as he and Castiel appeared in the 'relatively' tidy back yard, though it could use with someone definately mowing the lawn.

"Kansas," Castiel simply said as Bobby moved cautiously towards the house, which looked like it needed more than a little work done to it.

"Is he here?" Bobby asked before remembering the form that Dean was in the last time he had seen him, brother in one hand and bloody sword in the other. "Isn't that a little risky?"

"He is not as you remember him," Castiel replied.

"What does that mean?" Bobby asked as he peered in one of the windows to see the appearance of a normal suburban kitchen though there were paint cans in the corner.

"He has changed."

"What into something else? Tell me! It can't be worse than the last time I saw him when he was a blazing light of the Lord," Bobby retorted as he continued to look in the window.

"He had two requests," Castiel tried to explain. "One was for Sam to live out his life as a human."

"And the other?" Bobby asked anxiously turning his head to look as Castiel.

"It was in our Father's power to grant, along with many others."

"What is that suppose to mean?" Bobby asked confused.

"If you wait, you will see," Castiel said as he motioned to window.

* * *

"Shit, I'm going to be late!" Dean explained as he came flying past the kitchen door in a pair of sweats.

"You were the one who forgot to set the alarm," Anna said with a smile as she went into the kitchen.

"Pants!" Dean exclaimed as she seemed to start to make some coffee. "Where the hell did I put my pants?"

"Have you tried the closet?" she asked as he continued to search fruitlessly.

"Not those ones – the ones I had on last night, the ones I don't need you to fix," he explained as she got his lunch ready while pouring a cup of coffee.

"Why should I fix them?" she asked.

"Because you know I'll make it worth your while," he quickly replied.

"Try the back of the couch," she said with a smile, trying not to laugh as he ran into the front room.

"I set the alarm," he said as he strode into the kitchen, while fastening his belt. "I know I set that alarm."

"Dean, you didn't set the alarm," Anna said, handing him a lunch bag while he grabbed the coffee cup.

"Why the hell did I do that?" Dean asked.

She smirked, "The same reason your pants were on the couch."

Dean grinned. "Damn good reason. Think it will go down well with the chief?"

"Dean, go to work will you?" Anna replied with a shake of her head.

"Catch you later," Dean said as he gave her a kiss.

"Sure, what else am I going to be doing?" Anna replied.

"Thought you and RJ had your day planned," Dean asked.

"RJ?" Anna asked to which Dean shrugged. "Really?"

"That's what he told me," Dean said with a smile.

"You two had a long discussion about it."

"Sure, we sat down, had a beer, and before you ask, you were asleep," Dean replied. "Well, I had a beer, RJ not so much of a drinker, but what do you expect from a complete momma's boy, but once he starts can't shut him up."

"RJ, seriously?"

He gave her another kiss before he left to go to work.

"Had a beer with RJ," Anna said as she rubbed her forehead. "I'm living with a crazy person."

* * *

"Anna?" Bobby asked as he watched the seen. "Angel Anna?"

"No, Anna. Anna Dante fiancée to Dean Campbell, fireman stationed at Firehouse 19 Wichita Kansas," Castiel explained.

"You wiped his memory?" Bobby asked. "You fucked with his head again?"

"Yes and no," Castiel replied. "Dean had only two requests. The first you know – his brother's fate, the other was for Anna to be spared for her sentence as she joined the battle by our side. He did not request anything for himself."

"So you made him become her warden? You raised him up to fight your war, then dumped him back on earth so he could deal with another one of your messes? To let her do what she wants with him?" Bobby asked before turning angrily to Castiel, "No, I'm not standing here and letting this happen. I watched one son of John Winchester fall under the spell of a supernatural bitch, I am not letting the other do it. No way am I standing back to watch her twist him up and down. I don't care that she came from upstairs."

"I understand your cynicism," Castiel replied. "What you do not understand is, because of his actions and the fact he did not bargain on his own behalf, it was decided to allow him to fall, as with Anna. However, this time the fall was controlled and allowed them to end up here, a young couple who have recently moved to the area due to Dean's new job. He is not her warden; the man in that lives in that house has no real memory of the battle we endured after the last seal was broken."

Bobby took a moment, "What does he remember exactly? What did you do to him?"

"Most of the memories of his life are there, though to him it has been assimilated to something his new existence can cope with."

"Does he remember his family, his brother? Does he remember me?" Bobby asked tentatively.

Castiel nodded, "Yes, but instead of Bobby Singer hunter, Dean remembers you as his father's good friend who encouraged him to ask out his sister's daughter."

"He thinks I am his girl's uncle?" Bobby asked to which Castiel nodded.

"It is all there – his parents' death, Sam, you. However in his mind it is organised in a way to allow him to have peace."

"So if I walk in there now she'll think I'm her uncle?" Bobby asked.

"Yes," Castiel replied.

"Are you saying that at some point they could turn up at my door and you expect me to play happy families with them?"

"Would you turn them away if they did?" Castiel asked.

"That is wrong! I can't do this," Bobby said. "That isn't him."

"Isn't it?" Castiel enquired, "The house that has character but needs some work, a woman who cares for him, and a job in which he is able to affect a real outcome in people's lives. How is this not Dean?"

Bobby shook his head. "No, it's a lie."

"That is not what I asked you. Is this or is it not a life that Dean would like?"

Bobby thought for a moment, "That boy's a hunter."

"In time he may find his way back to it, but this time it will be by his own wish. No-one is forcing him to live his life in the manner you have just witnessed."

"You gave him a choice, didn't you?" Bobby asked.

"No, we gave him peace. He does not need to stay with Anna; he can leave if he wishes. All that has been done here was the removal of the barriers that prevented Dean Winchester from following a path of his own choosing."

"A normal life?" Bobby said. "You gave him a normal life after all he did for you?"

"We allowed one of the most powerful soldiers in heaven to fall. The rest was up to him," Castiel replied.

* * *

"Hi. I was wondering if you can help me," Sam said down the phone, "I need to activate a GPS chip on a cell."

He stood there listening for a second. "Well, yes I have an account with you. Well, not exactly me. My father. He's… well, he's starting to wander off, and he ducked out this morning, and we can't find him. He always has his cell on him. It's the only good thing about this, but he isn't picking up and I was hoping... Social security?... Sure, I have his social security number…. Yeah, I know. I hate seeing him like this."

* * *

"So he's happy?" Bobby asked, to which Castiel nodded. "You sure of that?"

"Dean chooses to have this mortal existence, he can alter is path at anytime," Castiel said. "His life here is no easier or harder than any other. We did not bless him with any advantages he could use in this life."

"What about demons? Something is going to be coming for him for payback," Bobby reasoned, to which Castiel shook his head.

"No demon will come for him."

"Are you protecting them?" Bobby asked.

"There is no need. If required, Dean is more than capable of protecting himself, although he is not consciously aware of it."

Bobby thought back for a second to the last time he had spoken to Dean Winchester, all fire and light cutting a swath of destruction in his path unlike any other that Bobby had ever seen.

"You left a ticking time bomb inside that boy?" Bobby asked. "Are you insane?"

"It was what was required," Castiel simply replied as he started to move off.

"Where are you going?" Bobby asked as he started to follow.

"To talk to him."

* * *

"Wichita Kansas. Why the hell did he take you to Wichita, Bobby?" Sam said as he began his long drive.

* * *

"Hey Jimmy," Dean said as he jumped down from the fire truck to greet Castiel. "When did you get into town?"

Castiel stretched his neck for a second before giving Dean a warm 'natural' hug. "Was in the neighborhood. Thought I'd pop by."

"You don't just pop by," Dean said slightly concerned. "Anything wrong, dude?"

"Nah. Got a new gig, that's all – sales force for the Midwest," Castiel said in his vessel's, Jimmy's, true light voice. "Means I'm on the road now."

"Man, that sucks. How's the family taking it?" Dean asked concerned.

Castiel shrugged. "I get home as much as I can. Can't say they're happy about the job, but it keeps the wolf from the door."

Dean nodded. "So you got a meeting and you thought you'd give your old buddy from camp a visit?"

"Well yes and no. Had a meeting in South Dakota and bumped into an acquaintance of yours, got talking, he had some business out this way, so I thought that since the boss is paying for the gas, why the hell not? Thought we'd go visit the wannabe fireman, even if we got to head back pretty soon" he said with a smile.

"Old acquaintance?" Dean asked tentatively.

"Yeah, well he's being shy," Castiel said motioning to the side of the building.

Dean smiled, "Bobby? Oh man, it is good to see you! Anna is going to be stoked."

Bobby took a second as he cleared his throat. "Hi Dean… How you been?"

"Well, job is what I expected," Dean said with a scratch of the head, "And the house… now Bobby I know what you are going to say when you see the place, that she deserves better and I know. But Anna fell in love with the dump and now has me fixing shelves and painting walls every spare moment I got."

"Really," Bobby said with a smile as he watched the enthusiasm on Dean's face.

"Well, you know," Dean said before looking at the two of them. "Dinner, you guys have got be at least sticking around for dinner, and if you can stand the chaos, you are going to stay with us, even if Jimmy here can get his company to pay for the motel. Why don't you give me the money? Help me pay for the new dry wall?"

* * *

Sam drove through the night, not caring for sleep as the road stretched out in front of him.

His phone hadn't rang. He couldn't be sure if it was because Bobby couldn't get in touch with him from wherever Castiel had taken him or that he had returned to the yard and assumed that Sam had just left and he no longer cared enough to call.

He tried to push that thought out of his mind – that his only real tangible connection that he knew he had to the world had turned his back on him – not that he could really blame Bobby if that was the case. If it hadn't been for his brother, his actions would have damned over six billion souls to damnation and at the time he could honestly have said he wouldn't have cared.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: The usual I own ...blah, blah, blah

A/N thanks to those who have reviewed so far and thank you for not flaming me if you don't like the idea of her and Dean hopefully this chapter will explain why she and Dean are together in this existence.

* * *

"So, Bobby, how's the yard and the dogs," Anna asked as she passed the potatoes. "Has that big bitch of yours had another litter?"

Bobby stopped for a second and looked at the girl in front of him. With her false memories of him as the eccentric uncle who lived in an old yard with dogs, shut off from the world, who she visited a handful of times before he introduced her to the son of an old customer, who at that moment was scavenging parts to rebuild an old junker as he didn't have the cash to hand to buy a car that didn't have "personality."

"No, not yet," Bobby answered as he took the bowl out of her hand.

"Shame, really," she said mournfully.

"No!" Dean said firmly, causing her to look at him. "We are not getting a dog right now."

"I'm not suggesting," Anna started to say. "Okay not right now, but I'm stuck here all day while you are out and it would keep me company."

"Have you seen this place? Anna, a dog? I can't go to the chief and say I have got to go home because my girlfriend called to say that she can't find the damn thing and she is convinced she can hear something scratching in the wall."

"Dean, don't exaggerate," she said calmingly, causing Dean to raise an eyebrow, "Fine, then, I'll just have to go out and find someone else to snuggle up to on the couch while my so called boyfriend is out all night long."

"You mean when I'm working?" Dean asked.

"You say that, but somehow I don't believe you." Anna retorted sarcastically.

"I'll tell RJ you are being mean to me!" Dean replied.

"Yeah, like that will work," Anna said with a smile.

"Get a dog later, then, when the house is further along?" Castiel said as he pushed the food around his plate.

"In a few months maybe, but a dog is a big commitment that I'm not sure I'm ready for," Dean admitted causing Anna and Bobby to look at him.

"A dog is a big commitment, that you aren't sure you are ready for?" Anna asked.

"What?" Dean asked. "Well, it is."

* * *

"He's really happy isn't he?" Bobby said as he settled on the couch.

"Yes," Castiel replied.

"And they think your name is Jimmy?"

Castiel nodded his response. "Yes, an old friend from the camp that Dean used to go to as a child."

"Right," Bobby muttered. "Can see that now, John Winchester letting his boys go to camp."

* * *

"Hi was wondering if you could help me," Sam said to the barman as he pulled out a picture. "Have you seen this man?" Sam asked, pointing at Bobby.

"Why do you want to know?" the barkeep asked.

Sam sighed; it had been a while since he had to do this.

"I'm an associate with Cartman, Broflovskvi and Marsh," Sam started to say. "I'm trying to track this guy down. His sister in Ohio is trying to track him down to deal with what is in his mother's will."

"Is there a finder's fee?" the barkeep asked.

"I can't really discuss that unless you have information," Sam replied.

"What about a cut about pointing in the right direction?" the barkeep asked.

Sam thought for a moment, "If the direction gets me where I want to go."

The barkeep took a breath. "I don't know why I am doing this – especially seeing how he'll get most of the cash."

"Can you get to the point?" Sam asked.

"Don't know the guy you are looking for, but the other guy in the picture you'll find at the firehouse down the block."

Sam took a moment before looking at the picture of Bobby and Dean. He swallowed his fear. "The firehouse down the block?"

* * *

"So you wiped their memories, sort of?" Bobby replied as he sat across from Castiel in a small diner near the firehouse.

Castiel nodded. "Yes, although some were given newly formed to ground him, but the major events of his life are still there. However, the remembrances of the supernatural elements of his or Anna's lives were amended. His father leaving to go on a hunt is remembered as his father starting another one of a series of short term jobs that he couldn't hold down after the death of Dean's mother."

Bobby clenched his jaw. "John might have been a bastard but that is cold to say that he screwed up his boys lives because he was a drunk who kept getting canned."

"It is not ideal," Castiel admitted. "But until other memories become re-assimilated, it was the only way."

"Other memories?"

"Ones that let them more fully understand their situation," Castiel said. "Although this process will be done in a way that they can still find peace, but this will take time."

"Why?" Bobby asked.

"Falling in the manner they were allowed meant Dean was allowed to keep part of his grace," Castiel explained. "The part of him given to him from the host, though it will take time to settle in its new form and hopefully he will never be fully aware of its presence within him. By the time he understands more fully what really happened, it should not create conflict within him."

"Then why do it? Why not take it all when you let him go?"

"Its presence within him prevents him being vulnerable to attack. The same can be said for Anna, though to a much lesser extent."

"Really?" Bobby asked. "It wasn't that, once you gave him the power of an Archangel, Dean was a little less co-operative in letting it all go because he didn't trust you bastards?"

Castiel didn't reply.

"You guys kicked off that cloud because he was ruffling those stuck-up feathers up there, didn't he?" Bobby asked.

Castiel bowed his head. "Dean's methods during the battle, though effective, created tensions in some quarters."

"Sounds like him – kicked some stuck-up Angel ass to make sure the job got done, didn't he?"

"That is one way to describe it," Castiel replied, though Bobby could have sworn that he saw a smirk cross the angel's face for a split second.

"And what does it mean when you say hopefully he'll never be fully aware of it? What exactly does that mean?" Bobby asked. "At some point is Dean going to burst into flames and take out everything in a ten mile radius? He was barely containing the power you saddled him with when he dropped Sam off at my place and that was when he knew what he was doing."

Castiel bowed his head. "No demon would be foolish enough to risk invoking even the shadow of the being that Dean became."

"He became?" Bobby spat out angrily. "That you and the rest of you manipulated him into becoming? Cleaning up your mess – you could have stopped Sam at any time. You could have found out what he had been doing so we could have helped him before it got as far as it did. You could have taken out Ruby at any time without breaking a sweat and you didn't. Instead you left it to Dean, expected him to stop Sam without all the facts. Then you turned him into your lighting rod and made him hunt down his brother. And don't you damn well say it wasn't Sam in the end you asked him to go after. I know it was the devil himself, but you told me yourself, Dean had to hack into the damn vessel that he'd fashioned himself in to – a vessel that looked like Sam, talked like Sam and damn well knew every thought that Sam Winchester ever had up until the moment that last seal was broken. So don't tell me that you didn't turn Dean into a walking nuclear bomb whose only purpose was to hunt down his own brother."

Castiel bowed his head as Bobby vented some of the rage and confusion that he had held back for so long.

"Now you're telling me that you have left a bit of that in him, and I'm guessing that was just in case a demon decides to take some stupid pills."

Castiel sighed. "In a way, yes, that is true."

"And Anna? Is she going to hulk out, too? Is Wichita going to have two bombs going off if some of Lilith's playmates want to get some payback?"

"No, especially not now," Castiel said. "Anna's circumstances are more fluid. The outcome is not clear."

"Not clear? Jesus, who is running things up there to let things get this far?" Bobby replied. "And don't give me your crap about giving them peace."

Castiel bowed his head, "When they fell at first, leaving them together was deemed a good idea. They would have someone in the same situation for support though they would not fully understand why they were there for each other."

"Dean would have been fine on his own. He would have found his feet, and maybe a way back to his brother, his family," Bobby stated coldly before looking at the mournful expression on Castiel's face. "You hoped that they'd stick together like this?"

Castiel cocked his head to the side, "If it is what this new life leads them to then, so be it. The battle, so much suffering in ways I cannot describe. If they have now found a way to be truly happy then can you argue with it?"

"Still don't make what you did to them right," Bobby replied.

"And…" Castiel started to say. "Anna first fell because she wished to experience the same emotions as humans."

"And feelings sure run deep in Dean, even if he needs someone to tell him he's feeling them most of the time." Bobby took a long look at Castiel before he took off his cap and ran a hand through his hair. "Oh shit, it was your idea wasn't it? The whole couple thing was your idea? Why? Is it…Jesus, you're in love aren't you. Is it her, did you do it for her or is it him?"

Castiel cocked his head, "Of course I love them, both of them. They are part of my father's creation. They fought bravely and they deserve peace and contentment."

"But pairing them off like this because you knew they'd look out for each other. Because you can't seem to make up your mind," Bobby said with a sigh. "Boy, angel or not, you are a class one eejit."

Castiel knotted his brow, "I do not understand what you are saying, Bobby Singer."

"You wouldn't would you," Bobby replied as he shook his head, "And what about Sam?"

"Sam Winchester's path is not my concern," Castiel replied.

"The boy needs to put things right with Dean," Bobby reasoned. "He won't be whole until he does. Dean can't ever become whole without it."

Castiel cocked his head to the side. "Do you really think that is a good idea at the moment? As you stated, Dean sent a being who wore his brother's visage back to its prison."

Bobby took a breath. "You saying that Dean seeing Sam could bring the Archangel out of him?"

"In time a meeting may be a possibility. However, if Sam faces his brother at the present time, I cannot be certain of the outcome."

"Dean'll come out fighting, if he thinks there's a possibility of a threat, you know that," Bobby retorted. "He's still a Winchester. That is what they do. That boy will protect what he's got."

Castiel nodded. "That seems to be a family trait."

* * *

Sam stood on the sidewalk watching the firehouse. At first he hadn't been sure if he was hallucinating or there was just some poor schmuck that looked like his brother. Whoever he was, he seemed to have an easy rapport with the guys he was working with. Though after he had learned the guy's name, there was no denying it was really his brother. Dean Campbell. Campbell – their mom's name.

In a way it was appropriate. For all of Dean's blustering attempts to become the copy of their father, it was their mother Dean took after. Sam knew it, in the back of his mind had always felt it to be true. The stories of his mother's personality seemed to gel with his brother's, especially after Dean had told him what he had seen, that she was a hunter in her own right even though she may have not liked the life.

Dean is, was and always will be the son of Mary Campbell, happy go lucky on the outside, wanting to live life, but sad inside, playing things close to the chest, willing to put themselves on the line to protect those around them, and for all Sam's attempts to deny it, he had proven to himself and the whole world he was the carbon copy of the single minded obsessive who couldn't see how his actions affected others until it was too late. Although he had to admit he had long surpassed John Winchester's league.

He stood there, not sure how to breathe as he watched Dean Campbell go about his daily business until, after five minutes, he turned and simply walked away.

* * *

"So given time Dean and everything within the county line might be able to cope with seeing Sam, but you aren't sure when that will be," Bobby said as he scratched his head. "And what about Sam in the meantime?"

"I have said Sam Winchester's life is his own," Castiel said.

* * *

The house was rickety, the front yard needing a little tending to. There was an old car in the drive, a 1960's Mustang that looked as if it was in the process of being rebuilt.

Sam took it all in. It hadn't taken long to get the address, but was this where his brother lived? Was this what the angels had abandoned him too? Dean had saved them all. Surely he deserved more than this. Surely he deserved more than suburbia.

On the rotted porch step, he noted the scratching – a ward against demonic activity, though it's rendering looked as if it had be placed there absentmindedly, as if the person who placed it hadn't realised they were dong it.

Sam brushed his hand over it. Had Dean sat on that step, knife in hand, scratching at the rotted board as he watched the world go by, leaving a barrier to protect himself without realising he was doing it? Sam smiled. He hoped so as it would mean that part of the Dean he knew might still exist . But did that mean Dean had chose this; chose to live here, not to get in contact with him, to move on without his brother.

The lock on the back door had been easy to pick, though Sam wasn't sure what he was doing, maybe just wanting to see that Dean was okay, and from what he could see in the house, he was.

"Oh, my god!" A plate shattered behind him as he looked around the kitchen.

Sam turned around to see her panicked face. "Anna?"

"Please, please take what you want," she said, backing away before she stopped cold, her face paling even more.

"Anna, it's okay. It's me," Sam said as he slowly approached her. Then he noted the way she was holding herself, shielding the swell of her belly. "Oh, my god! You're pregnant."

"You. It's you," Anna stated.

Sam swallowed. "Sam. It's Sam, I swear. I'm better now. I'm not like that anymore."

She didn't answer him. Instead she took a step back.

Even though he could see how scared she was, he gave her a shy smile. "Is it? The baby? Is it Dean's?"

"You stay away! You leave my baby alone!" she screamed, grabbing a knife from the work top. The next thing Sam knew, the world went white.


	4. Chapter 4

Hello another bit - hope it is okay for people!

Hopefully this will explain why Anna reacted to Sam the way she did.

* * *

"Anna Dante!" Dean screamed as he got to the nurse's station. "I got a call that you had Anna Dante here."

"And you are?" the nurse asked.

"Her fiancée. I got a call that said she was here, that she was… Please tell me that she and the baby are okay," he pleaded.

The nurse nodded as she directed him to where he needed to be.

* * *

Sam slowly came to. He was in the ER with Bobby and Castiel standing at the bottom of the gurney, not to mention a policeman.

"Sam, it's okay. Take your time," Bobby said as Sam began to panic at his surroundings.

Sam stilled. "What the hell happened to me?"

"We were hoping you could tell me," the policeman said. "You were found unconscious next to a woman in the process of going through a miscarriage."

"Miscarriage?" Sam asked looking at the pained look on Bobby's face.

"When her neighbor found you, Anna was… She was bleeding, Sam," Bobby said.

Sam looked away. "No, don't say I…"

"Dean and the docs are with her now," Bobby said. "They are doing their best. She ain't lost it yet."

At that point Sam glared at Castiel. "Is there nothing anyone can do?"

Castiel didn't reply as he turned to Bobby.

"Why were you at the house?" the policeman asked Sam.

"He's a work associate," Bobby said quickly. "I've been staying with my niece for a couple of days. Sam here dropped by with some stuff for me."

The policeman stilled, obviously noting that this wasn't the truth. "Do you have any idea what knocked you out? Doc can't find any physical trauma on you or any of the others."

"Others?" Sam asked.

Bobby took a breath. "Half the street was out cold."

"Yes, we are waiting on the tox results on all of you," the policeman explained. "But you got any idea what happened?"

Sam swallowed. "Ehm… I was talking to Anna, and next thing I knew I was here."

"Right," the policeman said. "I hope you are planning to stick around in case I got any other questions."

"I'm not going anywhere right now," Sam replied causing Bobby and Castiel to look at each other as the policeman left.

"He won't know you Sam. He doesn't know about hunting or anything that happened. They screwed up his head, took all of that out," Bobby explained. "He's just a regular Joe now."

"But Anna knew me," Sam replied. "Are you saying that Dean won't?"

"No," Castiel said. "He remembers you, though without the Supernatural elements. His mind, like Anna's, was rearranged so you do exist to him but not as you are now."

"Rearranged?" Sam asked. "What the hell did you do to him?"

"It's best you better get out of here, Sam," Bobby took a breath. "I'm going to go check on them, see how Anna and RJ are doing."

Castiel nodded as Bobby left them.

"RJ?" Sam questioned. "Who is RJ?"

"The child that Anna was carrying."

"Is carrying," Sam corrected. "Bobby said she hasn't lost the baby yet."

Castiel nodded before taking a breath. "You should leave this place."

"Can you help them?"

"Was it Anna that defended herself?" Castiel asked somewhat hopefully.

Sam wasn't sure why he was asking that. "I… One minute she's telling me to stay away, I think she went a knife then… the next minute I'm here. I don't know what happened in between, but you didn't answer my question. Can you help them? Anna and the baby? And don't say that it doesn't work that way. My brother has done enough for you, so you can damn well get your superiors to save his child."

Castiel said nothing for a minute as he seemed to become lost in thought. He raised his head looking Sam directly in the eye, "The fate of RJ is out of my hands. Nothing I can say will change the present situation."

"RJ. You keep calling the baby RJ," Sam said.

"It is the name that Dean has given the child, though I am aware that Anna is not happy about calling their son by initials."

"A boy?" Sam asked."Robert John Campbell," Castiel replied.

"They're having a boy?" Sam asked before taking a moment. "And now because of me…"

"This is not about you, Sam," Castiel admonished, "You should leave."

"Not until I see my brother," Sam said. "Not until I apologise to him."

Castiel took a breath as he made a move to follow Bobby. "Do you think that this will help to heal him or just you?"

* * *

Bobby found Dean, dressed in his work clothes, with his head in his hands as he sat in the floor of the corridor outside of Anna's room.

Dean looked up at him, his face stained with tears. He gave a weak smile as he rubbed his eyes. "Shouldn't really be here in this get up, you know? It's going to freak some people out or they are going to think I'm a stripper. Don't know what the department is going say to that."

"Don't think your bosses will mind too much right now," Bobby said as he saw just how hard it was for Dean to hold it together.

"They gave her something to help her sleep," Dean admitted as he stood up. "I couldn't stay in there."

"And?" Bobby asked tentatively.

Dean started to cry. "They don't know. They stopped the labor and they found a heartbeat, but they don't know if he's okay or if … or if she's going to … and if she does and they can't stop it, they say she'll have to give birth to him. They say it's too early; he's too small to make it so she'll have to give birth to a dead baby. Christ, Bobby, I feel so helpless. My son is fighting for his life before he's even born, and l can't do a damn thing! I should be doing something…I should have known that something…"

Bobby grabbed hold of the boy as he broke down, catching sight of Castiel out the corner of his eye. "You didn't do anything wrong, Dean. This ain't your fault or Anna's fault, you hearing me? That boy of yours is still hanging in there. Don't you count him out. He'll get here, and don't you let them tell you any different. But you got keep telling them that, tell that girl to keep hold of that baby tight and not to let him go."

Dean sniffed, "Yeah, yeah. You're right."

"You get back in there and tell that girl that," Bobby said as Dean nodded and went back to tend to Anna.

* * *

Sam grabbed his jacket before he headed over to the nurses station. "Hi, I know you can't really give me any real information, but the woman I was brought in with – Anna – can you tell me how she is doing? Are she and her baby going to be okay?"

The nurse politely brushed him off, saying that, even though she'd like to, she couldn't tell him anything as he wasn't family. "But, I'm… I'm kind of her or at least the baby's…"

"Hey, can you tell me where the OB/GYN place, floor, is? Where do you house the pregnant women?" the burly fireman said, interrupting.

"Smooth. Real smooth," the older man dressed in a pressed uniform behind him said with a shake of the head.

"We're looking for Anna Dante. She was brought in a couple of hours ago," the older man said, causing the nurse to think for a second.

She looked at Sam, knowing he had been basically asking something similar, before turning to the fire chief. "I wasn't aware that she had anything to do with the fire department."

"Don't want her vitals, sweetheart. Want to know where she is and that knucklehead of a so-called fiancée she's slumming it with is. Cut out on his shift, didn't he?" the first fireman stated firmly.

"Third floor, room 318," the nurse said, causing the large man to turn and look for the elevator.

"Wait," the fire chief said, grabbing his subordinate's arm. He turned to the nurse. "Can I have the insurance papers for them?"

"Excuse me?" she asked as Sam looked at the older man, confused.

"I want those papers, and you make sure anything that Anna and that baby needs, they get," the fire chief said firmly. "It don't matter what it costs. You send the bill on to the firehouse, you hear? I'll see that it is taken care of."

The nurse thought for a second, not really surprised at the older man's statement. "I'll just call billing."

The firemen looked at Sam. "Sorry, dude. This will only take a minute."

"It's fine," Sam said as the nurse made the call. "You know Anna?"

"More her uglier looking other half," the fireman said.

"Don't start, Pete," the fire chief said as the nurse came back with a couple of forms for him to fill in.

"Really?" Sam replied.

"How do you know her?" Pete asked.

"I… I was brought in with her," Sam said, causing the man to stand up straighter. "I'm not sure what happened. I was talking to her, and the next thing I was out cold, like half her block it seems."

Pete's eyes narrowed, "Yeah, like half her block."

"I didn't touch her, man, I barely got in the door and said hello," Sam said, noting the other man's discomfort, especially seeing how this man seemed to be a good friend of Dean's.

The man backed down. "Yeah, well if you have hurt her..."

"I wouldn't be stupid enough to hang around," Sam said.

"Okay," Pete said as he waited on the other fireman.

"Do you know them well?" Sam asked. "Do you know Dean and Anna?"

"Don't you?" Pete asked.

"Was just… looking for my boss," Sam said, remembering what Bobby had said to the policeman when he had talked to him. "He's Anna's Uncle."

"Right," Pete replied. "Didn't know Anna had one, but hell, so much he doesn't say about things."

"What?" Sam asked.

"Dean doesn't share much about his life apart from when he's with Anna," Pete said. "Oh, he'll talk, but not much personal, but he's been looking forward to this kid."

Sam stuck his hands in his pockets. "So some folk play it close to their chest."

Pete shook his head, "Don't know how Dean will take loosing the baby. He's been through the mill as it is."

"What?" Sam asked confused. "How?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Look, dude, I know I don't know you, but you can't tell me something like that and not tell me," Sam said. "I feel responsible enough as it is for a pregnant girl being in here even though I didn't touch her and then you say that..."

"Dean doesn't talk much, not about his past," Pete explained as Sam understood that Dean didn't remember all that he had lived through. "Took him saving my sorry ass and the best part of a case of whiskey to get him to open up a little to me, and most of this is the guys and me filling in the blanks. Not that we hadn't guessed before that – not with the tattoo and the way he talks, not to mention the dreams he has, plus that weird brand someone put on him like they owned him."

"Dreams?" Sam asked, concerned about what was haunting his brother's mind.

"Hell mostly, he said," Pete explained. "Not sure where the guy did time, but describes it was hell."

Sam guiltily looked at the floor as Pete continued.

"Don't think he was held in the US. Somewhere down South, and he didn't get convicted seeing how he got through the police screen for the job, but it was drugs we think, and he spent enough time in the place for it to screw the guy up," Pete explained.

"Drugs?" Sam said confused. Had the angels given Dean a cover story that he'd done time in some South American hole to cover his time in hell?

"Yeah, from what I said, he don't talk much, but he got drunk and let it slip that he had a kid brother."

Sam straightened, "Had?"

"Don't know if the guy is still alive, but Dean covered for him, Dean told the kid to walk, while he took the wrap. Not sure if that was the best idea Dean's had, but from the nights I've seen him wake up from those nightmares of his, I can't really blame him. He barely got through it. A drugged up kid would have been passed around like a piece of meat."

Sam took a breath.

"Also get the feeling that's what he had always done, looked after his kid brother, because their dad, well, Dean don't blame him, from the few things he said, the guy tried. But, I get the feeling that the guy didn't hold it together too well after Dean's mom died."

"Really?" Sam said, noting that in a way it was true – their dad hadn't exactly held it 'together' in the conventional sense after they lost their mom, causing his brother to look out for him more than he would have had to if they had been raised in a normal home. Dean had gone to hell because of him, looked out for him like he has always tried to do; even though he'd never asked him to do any deals.

"Yeah, sad thing is, whatever the kid said about staying clean while Dean was inside," Pete said, "I can't say for sure exactly went down, but from what I can piece together, Dean got out and found his kid brother strung out with some crack 'ho skank who was pushing."

Sam took a breath. Well, that was one way to describe it.

"Worst thing is that Dean tried to straighten his brother out and the damn 'ho went for Anna while the kid watched," Pete explained. "That was the last straw. Dean had to cut his brother out of his life after that, they even moved half way across the state because of it. So this baby, it would have been the icing on the cake, their chance to really start over, let them put all the crap they had been through behind them."

"Christ," Sam said quietly, taking the information in as he thought that, to this version of Dean, he was a drugged up crack head with a dealer for a girlfriend who stood by while she attacked Anna. It was a plausible scenario considering the Angels had removed only the memories of hunting from Dean's mind.

But him standing back while Ruby attacked Anna? That hadn't happened, not with Sam standing there. Did that mean that what happened was that Dean had found Anna being tortured by Ruby while Lucifer had watched? No wonder Anna had been terrified – Lucifer had been wearing a copy of Sam's face.

Sam steeled himself. He was going to make it right with Dean. He wasn't going to leave this place until he knew Dean and Anna were okay.


	5. Chapter 5

Well time for the boys to come face to face - hope the outcome is okay, though it isn't going to be as simple as people may think

Let me know your opinions and thanks to those who have reviewed this already, and to those who don't like it don't worry there is only going to be a couple of more chapters after this one.

* * *

Sam caught Bobby's eye as he got out of the elevator, causing the older man to get up and move quickly." You get out of here!"

"What?" Sam asked confused.

"Castiel get him the hell out of here," Bobby said to the Angel.

"No, I am not going anywhere. Not until I see Dean," Sam said firmly.

"You should go, Sam," Castiel explained. "The situation is complicated."

"Complicated?" Bobby asked. "How the hell is it complicated? You said you left that crap in 'em that they'd be able to protect themselves. Anna sure as hell did that – took one look at Sam and blasted the hell out of that house, and half the block to the point where she almost turned herself inside out? What the hell will Dean do?"

"What?" Sam asked.

"It was not Anna who reacted," Castiel solemnly stated.

"Then who? You got another Angel watching them?" Bobby asked.

"It was the child," Castiel flatly replied.

"What?" Sam asked, to which Bobby dismissed him with a wave of the hand.

"RJ?" Bobby asked. "The baby that ain't even been born yet?"

"It appears he reacted to his mother's panic," Castiel admitted. "It was a risk when the pregnancy was allowed to continue. We should have put a stop to it before they knew."

Sam turned to Castiel, "You would have ended it before they knew? That is my nephew."

Castiel ignored Sam at that moment, "If the child had gone to term without incident he would enter this world as a human child. Though, if he is aware in the womb to the point where he can affect his own will on the world, he has become nephilim, which is regrettable."

"Regrettable?" Bobby said angrily. "You Angels! You get written up as all powerful, know-it-all bastards, but truth is you ain't got a clue, have you? You push the two of them off a cloud, mash up their memories to think they are living the goddamn American dream, let them make a home, try to start a family and all the while you sit in the background, waiting to take that all from them, aren't you? After what Dean did for you. Is this what you wanted when you dumped like this?"

Castiel stood there stoically not replying to Bobby's anger.

"Nephilim?" Sam asked, "A child that is half Angel?"

"Yeah, and from what I remember, last time they walked the earth, God sent a great flood to destroy them didn't he," Bobby said to Castiel accusingly. "You really screwed the pooch on this one, didn't you!"

"Great flood?" Sam said. "You can't mean Noah and the Ark flood, do you?"

"The child's reaction to Sam's arrival was unfortunate, he should not have come here," Castiel admitted answering Bobby's accusation.

"Like I was going to sit still while you took the last person I knew I had on the face of this earth to god knows where," Sam said as Bobby looked back at the door to Anna's room.

"We got to get you out of here," Bobby said to Sam.

"I'm not leaving without seeing Dean, definitely not now."

Bobby pulled him into a sideroom. "Don't you get it Sam? That kid was conceived on Earth, not Heaven. That means that, to become half Angel, mommy and daddy are not all human themselves."

"What?" Sam said confused.

"They left some of the Archangel in him, Sam," Bobby explained. "Dean's the goddamn Manchurian Candidate waiting for a trigger, and considering that baby knocked out half a block before it was born when its mother saw you, do think it is a good idea for you and the rest of the state to go toe to toe with its daddy right now? I know you just want to make things right, but right now his kid is going to be playing more on Dean's mind than seeing his brother."

"What are you saying?" Sam asked.

"Sam, if Dean sees you, we might get lucky and he'd only take out half of Wichita."

"Sam, Dean's reaction to you maybe unsettling," Castiel said. "For you and all around you."

"Unsettling? You are telling me, if my brother sees me, that half the city could be wiped out? And I thought it was bad enough he thinks I am some junkie who let his dealer attack his girlfriend?"

"What?" Bobby asked.

"Oh, yeah, they screwed with Dean's mind alright – took the hunting away, but put all this stuff in his head that his time in hell – some prison time to cover for his strung out brother. And then when he got out, I was a crack head who was hanging with his dealer. "

"Was that not the case?" Castiel asked Sam.

"Not in the way you put it on his head, Cas!" Sam replied.

Castiel cocked his head, "Did your brother not barter his freedom for yours, Sam and even though you promised him not to use your abilities, did you not do so with Ruby's aid? Did you not become addicted to what she offered you?"

"But wasn't it enough to just to warp the crap that I actually did," Sam protested. "You are letting them think that it was me that sat back and let Ruby have some fun with Anna, not Lucifer because isn't that what happened? If you wanted to give them peace why leave them the memories of that?"

Castiel turned to Bobby, "Yes, Dean believes that his brother is the man that Sam described. It was a way to ensure Dean would not seek out his brother until he was ready, by the time Dean's pain subsides on these matters, what was left in him should have settled and then he will be able to seek out Sam, with no need to worry with regard to any 'repercussions'. Though it will be his choice if he does so."

Bobby glared at Castiel as the angel continued to explain. "Anna was the one who dealt with Ruby, but that was after Anna fell prey to one of the auditions to take Alistair's place as torturer in Lucifer's army."

"Anna was Ruby's audition on Lucifer's version of Hell Idol?"

"Yes, if my understanding of your comparison is is correct," Castiel replied. "Anna was taken into custody prior to the seal being broken. She wished to fight in our cause so I helped her escape during the early stages of the battle. She exposed some in the garrison who, like Uriel, had allied themselves with Lucifer. Unfortunately, during the fray, she was delivered unto the other side. By the time we rescued her, she had suffered greatly."

"That is why Dean asked to save her, didn't he? Why after they fell you made sure she had someone to watch out for her, you knew Dean would want to make sure she was okay," Bobby said, to which Castiel nodded.

"So what now?" Sam asked.

"You leave," Castiel said to Sam. "The path is set."

Sam looked at the expression on Castiel's face. "No! Cas, you can't!"

""The child cannot be born," Castiel stated.

"Take me!" Sam said quickly. "Do some angel crap and take me for the baby. If the kid can still be born human, take the one that woke up the nephilim in him. You get to do what you want with me. Put me in the same place you put the devil."

"Sam, shut up," Bobby said.

"No Bobby, Castiel is going to take me and he's going to let Dean have his son, aren't you Cas?" Sam said, turning to the Angel. "You are going to let my brother become a father. I'm the one that needs to be punished."

"I do not understand," Castiel admitted.

"You got me, you got me in the worse way you could possibly punish me and not drag me to hell. It's my fault this is happening, I'm responsible for Dean waiting to see if his baby will make it," Sam said. "I admit it; this hurts more than knowing that the last seal opened because of me, that the devil got out because I was stupid, that I was responsible for the world almost going to hell. But don't punish Dean! I'm the one that needs to take the fall, so do it, take me but leave my brother alone. If you're doing all of this because you need me to tell you that you can do what you want to me so you don't need to break your word to Dean then you got it! Take me instead of Dean's kid."

"It is not my choice," Castiel replied. "The decision was made long ago on this matter. Even if another could be taken in the child's place, Sam's soul would not be a satisfactory replacement."

"Anna ain't a daughter of man, and Dean was never your garden variety Angel even before you threw him off that cloud," Bobby argued. "So it don't mean it is going to play out the same way in the book of Enoch. RJ doesn't need to be considered a threat until he really does something. It isn't like the nephilim that came before, had parents in the same situation as Dean and Anna. You don't want to do this to them Cas, you didn't put them down here to take their baby from them. You wanted them to be happy, to have something that you couldn't give them any other way. They can control their kid. You got to give them that shot."

"The child has already 'done something.' The next time people may not be as fortunate to survive," Castiel explained. "The Nephilim brought pain and chaos in their wake; it will not be allowed to happen again."

"Let them have their baby," Sam argued.

Castiel shook his head, "The child would not be controllable."

Bobby put a calming hand on Sam's arm as he addressed Castiel, "Can you be sure of that? Sure RJ took out a block, but no-one got seriously hurt and he was doing it to protect his mother, doing as she would have done if she had the chance. You can't say that he won't listen to his parents after he's born, you haven't given him a real chance."

"It would be better for RJ to be taken into to the light now, for him and his parents," Castiel stated.

"That is bullshit," Bobby argued. "You can't say that. You can't do that to Dean!"

"And to loose his son once he was born?" Castiel asked. "Once he has held the child in his arms? After he witnesses the wave of destruction his child will bring on the world. Would that be better?"

Sam took a breath. "There has to be another option? I'll stay away, I won't try and see my brother ever again; I won't give RJ a reason to do something like this again."

"It is out of my hands, I have no say in this decision, I cannot change RJ's fate," Castiel, said causing Sam to raise an eyebrow.

"You can't, but there is someone?" Sam asked. "Who do I call for the appeal? Zachariah? Someone higher? Who the hell do I beg?"

Castiel cocked his head as he looked at Sam, "It would not be wise."

"Wise?" Sam yelled. "Who the fuck do I talk to?"

"What the fuck?" Dean exclaimed as he stood in the doorway.

He had been talking to his friend Pete, letting him know the situation and thanking them for coming by. It was Sam's voice that had done it. He had heard Sam and wandered down the corridor to the side room that Bobby had pulled Sam into.

Sam swallowed. "Dean?"

"Sam? What the hell are you doing here?" Dean said angrily.

"You know this guy?" Pete asked.

Dean's breathing became agitated, "Yeah, I know him."

"Dean, calm down," Bobby said as he noted Dean clenching his fist.

Pete looked at Sam as he sensed his friend's discomfort. "Downstairs you said you didn't know them."

"I…."

"Dean, you got to keep calm," Bobby reiterated as Dean became more and more tense.

"You talked to him?" Dean asked Pete, to which Pete nodded. "Yeah, he was brought in with her."

"I never touched her, Dean. I saw her and I didn't know what would happen. If I had, I would have stayed away," Sam said. "I just wanted to see that you were okay. That is all. I'll go."

"You saw Anna?" Dean said coldly as he faced Sam. "You did this."

Bobby put himself in between the two men, "Dean, it ain't like that. You got to stay calm. It ain't Sam you want to kill. It's someone else. I know it's all twisted up in your head, but remember Sam, your brother, your little brother. If you can't focus on that, think of your boy and Anna. You got to stay calm for them."

"Sam?" Pete said, turning his focus. "The junkie brother?"

Dean's face turned cold, causing Sam to take a step back. "You shouldn't have come here. You won't escape me this time."

Bobby turned to Castiel, "Damn well do something before he blows!"

Castiel grabbed hold of Dean pushing him into the wall as Dean began to glow. Dean struggled, grabbing hold of Castiel's chest, obviously causing Castiel considerable pain, though the move allowed Castiel a free hand to touch Dean's forehead. "Remember."

Dean stilled, as the others watched. He blinked, looking at the others, focusing on the Angel in front of him. "Castiel?"

"Hello, Dean," Castiel said as he took a step back.

"It's good to see you, boy," Bobby said.

"Where am I?" Dean said, looking down to see the way he was dressed. "Why am I…? Am I one of the village people?"

"You've been playing fireman," Sam said as a confused Pete watched. "Finally got the job you said you always wanted."

"Fireman? Really?" Dean said with a smile before he looked at Sam. His face became concerned before tensing.

"It's okay, Dean. I'm clean and you won," Sam said. "I'm really Sam. I'm nothing else."

"It is Sam, and your request was honored," Castiel said as Dean's anger subsided for a moment.

Dean looked away, his jaw clenched. "You should leave Sam. You shouldn't be here. You should have the life you wanted. Leave the fight to those that want it. Cas get him out of here, get him out of here now!"

"Those who want it?" Sam said confused. "Dean, look at you. You don't want it either."

"What?" a confused Dean asked.

"It's been almost a year, Dean," Bobby stated. "A full year and not a word. They let you fall. You got a job, boy, and you got a kid on the way."

"Excuse me?" Dean asked. "Can you say that again?"

"Dean, you're in a hospital," Sam said. "Can you remember why?"

"What the fuck is going on?" Pete asked.

Dean thought for a second, he put his head in his hands as he grimaced in pain. He looked up, focusing on Sam. His eyes bright, his skin a glow as a tremor began to move through the hospital, "You came here. You will not taint the innocent."

Castiel stepped in front of the slowly awakening Dean. "You succeeded in sending Lucifer back to his prison. This is not the Morningstar. The battle is over. It is time to allow you to rest."

"Rest?" Dean questioned. "Lucifer, the Morningstar is gone? The seals reset?"

"I serve only our Father – I would not lie to you on this matter." Castiel said solemnly to which the only response was that the hospital ceased to quake.

Dean stared at Sam for a moment; he took a step forward, cocking his head to the side. "Sam? That really you?"

Sam held back his tears. "Yeah, you did it, Dean. You saved everybody, bro. You saved me. You did something stupid and saved my ass - again. I sorry Dean, I'm sorry for all of it, I should have listened to you about her...about everything. I'm so sorry about..."

Dean grabbed hold of his brother, glowing white as he did so. "Sam!"

Sam felt pain and serenity at the same moment as his brother held him.

"Dean, you got to let him go, you are going to kill him," Bobby stated as he witnessed the sight.

After a moment Dean took a step back before he looked at Bobby, who took had backed away a little from the unearthly thing that the boy he loved had become.

Dean looked at his hands which were pulsing with power. He turned to Castiel, "What have you done to me? I'm not… me anymore… What am I?"

"You fell, Dean," Bobby said. "They put you up, and when they were done they let you fall, but they didn't put you back the way you were. You got to stay calm, because even if you ain't as powerful as you were, you can still do damage."

"Damage?" Dean asked. "Is that why I'm in a hospital?"

Pete, not too sure what the hell was going on, said, "You're here because of Anna."

"Anna?" Dean said recognising the name. "Anna's here?"

"Yeah, Dean. She fell with you," Bobby said.

"What?" Dean was confused. This wasn't making any sense.

"I'm sorry, Dean," Sam said apologetically. "I didn't know if you were dead or alive. I just wanted to know if you were happy. They fucked up both your and her heads so, when she saw me, RJ was protecting her, and now… If I had known, I would have left you alone."

Dean stood there for a second before he bolted out the door to Anna's room.

* * *

Anna was still asleep, machines beeping that were monitoring hers and the baby's heartbeats.

"You understand what must be done," Castiel said as he followed Dean into the room.

"No," Dean said stoically.

"The decision was taken long ago. Nephilim will not walk the earth again," Castiel stated.

"I didn't say that I didn't know what you were going to try to do," Dean said. "It just ain't going to happen."

"He will become a giant among men and cause chaos and pain. It will not be allowed to happen."

"Then why?" Dean asked. "Why let it get this far? You could have taken him at anytime. Why wait until she's more than half way there."

"He awoke," Castiel stated. "If he hadn't, he would have been born human."

Sam watched the scene, feeling guilty as he stood in the corner.

"This isn't going to happen," Dean stated coldly as he took hold of Anna's hand while placing the other on the swell of her belly.

"I am not able to affect the outcome."

"We'll get her out of here," Bobby said offering a solution. "We'll run. She's good at it; she'll know what to do. Wake her up properly and we'll run before those winged bastards come for RJ."

"That will not work," Castiel stated. "They will find you and take him. If you allow it now, your son's soul will be allowed to reside in the gardens of heaven. If we take it later, I cannot promise he will have that fate."

"Can someone tell me what is going on?" Pete asked. "Who are you people? What the fuck was going down out there?"

"They are going to make Anna loose the baby," Sam said.

"Who?" Pete said agitatedly.

"The angels," Bobby said.

"It isn't going to happen," Dean said placing a kiss on Anna's head.

"You know what that means," Castiel said.

"Wake her up," Dean ordered the other Angel.

"It would not be in Anna's or your best interest."

Dean turned his full attention towards the Angel. "I wasn't asking, Cas. Wake her up and get out!"

"Dean?" Sam said confused.

"Give me a minute, Sam, please." Dean said. "And can you explain things to Pete for me."

"What?"

"Tell him everything and Cas is going to make him understand we ain't crazy."

"Dean, what are you going to do?" Bobby asked as Castiel touched Anna on the forehead and moved to leave.

"Give me a minute," Dean said quietly. "Just give me a minute to do this."


	6. Chapter 6

God has it been a week since I posted - didn't mean to leave it that long. Well here is the next bit. Hope people like it.

* * *

As she came to, Dean sat on the bed and stroked her hair. "Hey, you. How you feeling?"

"Dean?" Anna was confused. "Where am I?"

"It'll take a minute or two for things to get straight in your head, so stay calm. You got some juice still in you."

She took a moment, looking at her surroundings. She was in a hospital. "Am I injured?"

"What do you remember?" Dean asked as he sat beside her on the bed.

"Ruby, I was so ang… I cut her head off," Anna said.

"Redheads and their tempers," Dean smiled. "Not like Ruby didn't deserve it for what she did to you, for what she did to Sam."

"Why am I here, if I am not injured?"

"We fell," Dean said. "They let us fall, but they screwed up. They took who we were away, but not all of our grace."

Anna looked concerned at him as she took his hand, feeling the power coursing through his veins. "Dean, you have to be calm. You shouldn't be on Earth even like this."

"I know," Dean said with a nod, "I got a plan about that, but I got to take care of something first, because they fucked up big time and I'm not having anyone else pay the price. Not now, not with this."

"Dean, I don't understand," Anna said as Dean moved his arm to allow her to see the swell under the blanket. Anna's eyes went wide, "Oh, my god!"

"Anna, you can't get yourself worked up," Dean said as she tried to get up. "He's already knocked out half our neighborhood; I don't know how that will work in a hospital."

"How?" Anna asked.

Dean smirked, "Well you've been around longer than I have. If you don't know how things work considering you were probably around when it was invented, then I think you're in trouble. You are a little old for sex ed."

"Dean, this is serious," Anna stated, causing his face to fall.

He picked up her left hand, fingering the small ring that was on her finger, "They let us go and it looks like we decided to find a way together. What can I say – I'm adorable ain't I? As for the rest – well, nature ain't it," Dean said with a smile, "But he woke up. Sam came looking for me and spooked you and our boy. He woke up so he could look after his mom."

"A boy?" Anna asked. "We are having a boy?"

"Yeah," Dean said as he stroked her face.

She took a deep breath as her mind settled, "Robert? We decided on Robert didn't we?"

"Yeah Robert, RJ for short, remember?" Dean said. "And he's already shown he's got some spunk. But what can you expect from a Winchester?"

"We had a scan, didn't we?" she asked.

Dean nodded, "Yeah, with the weird floating thing with the little hands and feet."

"And said swore that it was grit in your eye when they said he probably knew your voice when you said he was waving at you on that little screen."

"Showed you that I wasn't crazy didn't it."

"If you woke up in the middle of the night and found someone holding a conversation with your stomach wouldn't you call them crazy?"

"You know, you shouldn't call the father of your child that in front of him." Dean said with a smile on his face.

After a second Anna started to shake her head, "No. This can't be. They won't allow it. It's an abomination. They'll never allow him to be born."

"I know, but I'm going to fix that," Dean said, trying to be strong.

Anna shook her head. "No, Dean, you can't."

"RJ is going to be born and have the life that the people we became wanted for him. It's just that I won't be there," Dean said. "Not like he'll miss me."

"No Dean. No!" Anna argued as Dean moved his hand down to feel the baby kick.

"Anna, I got it all worked out," Dean said. "He'll have you, and it isn't like I wouldn't have screwed him up anyway. Pete's outside. Cas and Bobby are explaining things to him. He'll be there for you and the little guy when you need him."

"It's not fair."

"When has heaven been fair to us?" Dean asked. "Actions have consequences. This is just one of them."

"Dean, you can't do this," Anna said as Dean kept his hand on her belly.

"It is my choice and I'm not putting our boy at risk. But, they are going to make someone pay Anna, they have to, and it can't be you. I'm not letting him loose his mom too," Dean explained.

"Dean, but…"

"Don't worry; I didn't start out as an angel remember?" Dean explained.

"Dean, you can't be sure of they'll do that!" she cried, "If they don't they'll…"

"Anna," he said softly as he tried to calm her. "They won't put me in the same place as they put the last load of angels that did this; where they'd put you. I'll be okay, they won't bind me. You know what they'll do."

"And after?"

"You know me - I'll deal with that when the time comes," he said light heartedly.

"No, that's not right! We'll run. We can hide, we can protect him," Anna said.

Dean shook his head, "No. Won't work, and you know it. Anyway, don't the stories say that the Nephilim were big fuckers? What are we going to do when he becomes ten foot tall, hide him in a closet? This way he'll get a life, be human, be normal, and you won't have to worry about getting baby clothes. Though it'll mean he won't be a shoe in for a basketball scholarship when it comes time for college."

"Dean, please," Anna said. "Don't I get a say?"

Dean shook his head, "I'm the boss, remember? I got the stripes and you don't, solider. You got the demotion. I'm ordering you to raise this kid and…to move on – find someone who will be good to you, who'll make you and him happy. Don't sit back and waste the life they gave you. Don't let our son mourn for a father he'll never know. Find someone our boy can make proud."

"I don't take orders," Anna replied.

"On this you got to."

"You don't deserve this."

"That doesn't matter."

"They'll make you forget your life here, your life with me. You don't deserve to be made to forget your child."

"Anna, don't make this harder," Dean said as he brought her forehead to his. " I know I won't remember, and after this I'm going back to that horn dog you first met who'll get drunk and find a cheap blonde, but whatever I do, me here, if I'd had the chance…I would have tried…"

"You would have been a good husband and father to us." Anna said, holding back the tears. "You are never going to get to hold him. You won't even see him born."

"I know."

"You could pass him in the street, and you'll never know," Anna said.

"Best that way," Dean said as he moved his hand down to her belly. "Now this is going to sting a little."

* * *

"You are serious aren't you?" the fireman said as the three men stood in front of him.

Sam nodded.

"Jesus," Pete exclaimed before looking in Castiel's direction. "Ehm, sorry I didn't mean… Oh, he… boy."

A light emitted from the door causing them all to turn their attention to the room.

"What is going on?" Bobby asked.

"Your brother has made his decision," Castiel said.

"What the hell does that mean?" Sam asked. "I want a straight answer this time, not any of your enigmatic bull."

"As a member of the Seraphim, he has the power to change the child's fate," Castiel explained.

Sam thought for a second, "Dean can make the baby human?"

Castiel nodded.

"What are you going to do to Dean?" Bobby asked. "Doing that goes against your orders doesn't it? They are going to make you be the one to punish him, aren't they?"

Castiel bowed his head, causing Sam to clench his jaw. "You bastard!"

"Sam, you don't get it," Bobby said noting Castiel's reaction. He turned to the angel, "You don't have to, you don't have to do this; you can just walk away right now. If the kid isn't a threat anymore then you've done what you need to do. You don't need to do anything else. You didn't leave them together to do this to Dean now, you can just walk away."

"If I do not perform this task, the end outcome maybe different," Castiel replied. "It is for the best that this is done now, before more damage is done."

"You are going to punish him, take his kid away from him and you make it sound like you are doing Dean a favor?" Sam spat out with venom. "After all my brother did for you."

"He ascended to protect you as much as by God's will," Castiel accused Sam. "It was your presence that triggered this situation. You were told that it would not be in your brother's interest for you to see him, did you not think that there was a reason I told you that."

"You bastard," Sam said taking a step forward as the door opened.

"She's asleep," Dean said turning to Castiel, "It's done, and you'll make sure they are protected?"

"Your son will be watched over," Castiel said as Dean took Pete by the arm to take the man aside.

Sam watched as his brother talked to his friend, it didn't take much to guess what was being said – asking the confused man to look out for Anna and the kid as Dean wouldn't be able to.

Pete nodded and went into the room to sit with Anna.

Dean turned to Castiel, "Let's get this over with. Do it!"

Castiel bowed his head, "I…"

"Don't go through the "it pains me" crap. Do it. Take it back. Rip it out of me," Dean challenged the angel in front of him.

"Dean," Castiel said.

"Castiel, I know you can't bind me in that hole, so me human and fuck up my head. Make it that I live out my days as a vegetable if you have to and yeah, I know I'll never get into heaven now. Never thought I was going there anyway, so just do it," Dean said.

"Hell will not take your soul, either, when the times comes," Castiel stated.

"Like I want to go to either. I'll sit outside the gates and run a poker school with the other rejects, so just get it over with," Dean yelled.

"Not get into heaven or hell," Sam asked, getting in the way of his brother and Castiel. "Dean, think this through. You lead their army. They owe you."

"If it means RJ has a life, then I don't care," Dean said. "I took the kid's grace and most of Anna's so it won't happen again. It all needs to go back and I need to be punished for fathering him."

"Punished? You didn't know, for god's sake. How could they punish you when you didn't know what you were?"

"It doesn't work like that, Sam. They aren't going to make any exceptions, not on something like this. Not on the Nephilim; will they, Cas?" Dean said causing Castiel to bow his head in silence as Dean addressed his brother. "This way it all goes back to the way it was."

"Dean," Bobby said. "Don't do this. I'm not going to let you do this. They left that shit in you so you could protect yourself."

"I know, and it just backfired big time. I left a little in Anna – she should still be able to send up a flare or two if she needs to, but not enough to pass on if she has another kid," Dean replied. "As for me, I'll have to look after myself the way you and Dad taught me, won't I?"

"Dean," Bobby said. "Don't do this. I'm not going to let you do this."

Dean nodded, took a step towards his friend to place two fingers on Bobby's forehead. "I know."

Sam grabbed hold of Bobby as he went down, "What did you do?"

"Let's get this over with," Dean said to Castiel, who nodded and effectively punched a hole in Dean's chest as a stunned Sam watched.

Castiel pulled out a ball of light as Dean stood there gasping. The hole slowly repaired itself as Castiel's hand retreated.

Dean fell to his knees as Castiel forced his palm to Dean's skull, pulling the memories of his life as Dean Campbell out of his mind.

"It is done," he stated as an unconscious Dean laid on the floor.

Sam gently put Bobby down and got to his feet. "And what now?"

"Now?" Castiel said.

"Yes now," Sam asked. "You just going to remove Dean from this life, let the world think Dean walked out on his family? And what about RJ and Anna? They need him."

Castiel thought for a second, "Anna Dante will be resurrected without the presence of Bobby. Memories can be rewritten. She ended up in hospital because she of the stress she suffered on hearing the news that her fiancée was killed heroically in a fire. She will receive… his benefits.

"That isn't what I meant!" Sam retorted.

"It is all I can offer," Castiel replied. "Dean's friend Pete will honor his promise to Dean without being burdened with the whole truth of this day. Bobby will not remember what exactly occurred."

"And Dean?"

"He will not remember anything of this day or this life," Castiel said. "In fact, the only one who will remember the truth of this will be you. Bobby and he will think that you found him in this place after he was simply left to wander the Earth." Sam looked at him, confused. "Your brother is human now. He will not remember what has occurred since he fell."

"You can't do that."

"It is already done, Sam."

"What if I…?"

"If you tell?" Castiel said.

"Yes, if I tell." Sam said. "Are you going to now screw with my head now to stop me?"

"No, but if you do say what has occurred and your brother comes into contact with his son with full possession of that knowledge, then all of this will be for nought."

Sam couldn't believe what he was hearing. "You'd…?"

"Not I. Dean cannot come in contact with his son knowing that the child is his while RJ is in his minority or the child will suffer. Can you do that Sam? Tell Dean that he has a child and then tell him he cannot go to him? Can you be sure that your brother would not come charging in to see the son he sired even if you tell him the consequences?" Castiel asked. "You understand what will happen to the child if that was to occur? Can you live with that outcome if you decide to unburden yourself on this matter?"

"You planned this. You knew what would happen if I found them," Sam said angrily.

"It was a possibility," Castiel admitted, "I prayed the outcome would be otherwise, that the child would not react to your presence in the way he did, but I was wrong."

"Why then? Why risk it," Sam asked. "You could have come and talked to Bobby after the kid was born; you could have let me see them then or was this more about how you were going to punish me? Fine, I deserve it. I deserve a hell of a lot more, but don't do this to Dean. At least leave him his memories that he left to protect his son."

"This isn't about you Sam, it never was," Castiel said.

"Then why?" Sam asked.

Castiel bowed his head, "Heaven is in disarray, Sam, the breaking of the seals and those who listened to Uriel's call to join Lucifer have caused much pain through the ranks. The search for them all still continues. Some have fled before they could be brought to rule. Others still reside among us, hiding and waiting, for what, I do not know. The child was bringing an already tense situation to a crisis. There were whisperings he was becoming aware anyway, some had stated stirrings had been felt. It was felt necessary to be sure."

"To be sure?" Sam asked. "You put us all through this just so you can be sure? My brother looses the chance to have a family of his own just because you felt the need to know?"

"You do not understand Sam," Castiel stated. "Your nephew was already causing further division in the garrison. His existence was being used by some as a rallying cry, Sam causing further dissention in the garrison. The knowledge that a nephilim truly existed would have been the cause of chaos."

"Chaos?"

Castiel nodded, before saying simply, "Heaven is at the brink of a second civil war."

"Where's God in all of this?" Sam asked.

Castiel knotted his brow as he bowed his head for a second. He met Sam's gaze, taking a breath before quietly uttering, "I do not know."

"So you made Dean choose?" Sam said.

"Others were to be sent to take the child, even though at that point we could not be sure of the truth – your brother and Anna would have fought, sides would have been taken, and blood would have been shed here and in the gardens above. It would have not been in anyone's best interest for that to occur. I could not allow them to loose the child in that manner. I could not allow them to be put in that situation."

"So you forced things," Sam said. "Brought Bobby here, let me find them knowing what would happen; that if that baby was going to react to anyone it would react to me."

"Yes," Castiel replied calmly.

"So much for you letting Dean have peace."

"And I told you that it was not in your brother's interest for you to contact him, but you still came. You could have listened to my words and not followed us, not picked up the trail I allowed and waited until we returned," Castiel retorted as Sam continued to glare angrily at him.

"You could have asked why I did not bring you to him. You could have questioned why you were able to find us so easily. But you did not. You came here - your choice, Sam, not mine. I did not force you to seek your brother out. I stated that actions have consequences, your choices affect others, but even after all that has occurred it appears that you still do not seem to be able to grasp that concept." Castiel replied causing Sam to look away in shame.

"Please don't do this to him," Sam begged.

"He made his choice, Sam – his son's existence for his power and his memories of his time here, and my superiors did not have to become involved," Castiel explained. "The child now has the chance at a life, as your brother wished for him; the same can be said for Anna. Your brother can have a life too, even though it is not one with his son and no blood was shed – Dean understood the price he paid here. We as you would say will just have to 'live with it'."

"You can't be serious?" Sam replied.

"Yes, I am. As for you, yes I leave you your memories, Sam, not as a punishment, even though you may think it is, but to ensure your brother and his child are kept apart, for all our sakes. For their sakes."

"What about after – Dean wouldn't get into Heaven or Hell? Tell me that isn't true!"

Castiel closed his eyes. "Hell, yes, but in time Heaven may open to you brother. He was not aware of the true situation when he fathered the boy and he served well. I will try."

"May be open to him? You'll try? That is all you can do?" Sam spat out.

"I understand your anger," Castiel said.

"Anger?" Sam replied. "You rob him of his son, tell him he's not going to either Heaven or Hell after he dies and you think I'm just angry?"

Castiel stood silently for a moment, "Given time he maybe allowed entry."

Sam took a moment to think, "Dean made you give me a clean slate? A do over, right?"

"Yes?"

"If I have a clean slate, do I have a chance to get into Heaven?" Sam asked.

"Yes," Castiel answered. "But your admittance is not guaranteed."

"So if I work my butt off and say I get in?"

Castiel bowed his head, "Sam, as I told you, I will try."

"He doesn't deserve this!"

"They will not listen to anything you have to say on this matter."

"So, you make the offer."

Castiel sighed, "Nothing you or I can say or offer can chance the situation at present."

"I don't care if I have to wait fifty years for my answer, but you make the damn offer."

"You do not understand," Castiel tried to explain. "Heaven at present… I am not sure it is somewhere Dean would want to know was open to him, especially at the price you wish to pay."

"It would be my choice and before you say anything I understand what will happen. I know the consequences," Sam retorted.

"They will not give you the answer you seek."

"You tell them that my brother is getting in. I'll do whatever they want of me, but he gets in," Sam yelled.

"You forget who you address," Castiel said firmly. "We do not bargain on matters such as this and we do not bend to your whim."

"Please," Sam begged.

"I will do all in my power for him, but it will take time."

"Time," Sam muttered as he worked through things in his mind. "You said Dean can't know while RJ's in his minority. Does that mean that Dean might be able to see him when he grows up – that I can't tell my brother anything for twenty years?"

Castiel blinked. "In time they may be reunited, but not now Sam, it is too dangerous for your nephew and your brother."

"So I got a choice of keeping this from Dean forever or I wait twenty years tell him, let him charge in here and screw up RJ's life? Because Dean looking the kid up after he's all grown and telling him that the Angels were the reason his Dad wasn't there for him is going to do that."

"The decision is yours; I cannot advise you all I can promise you is that I will ensure your nephew is watched over until the day you make your decision."

"Until I make my decision?" Sam looked at him in disgust. "You are a bastard Castiel. All the shit you just laid down about my actions and my choices. It's all bullshit; because it doesn't change the fact you played me, played Dean. Christ, you played a kid that hasn't seen the light of day yet. You are worse than Ruby, because at least she only toyed with grown ups."

"Yes, I believe you are right," Castiel solemnly admitted with a nod as he left Sam.

* * *

A/N Okay I thought I should put a little bit of explanation of why the Nephilim to my understanding are bad and why RJ being one would have caused such a big fuss with the Angels. This is what I could find on wonders of the internet-

What was born after the daughters of men met the sons of heaven (fallen angels) and bore the Nephilim

_And they became pregnant, and they bare great giants, whose height was three thousand ells. Who consumed all the acquisitions of men. And when men could no longer sustain them, the giants turned against them and devoured mankind. And they began to sin against birds, and beasts, and reptiles, and fish, and to devour one another's flesh, and drink the blood_

And God orders the imprisonment of the fallen angels.

_"And the Lord said unto Michael: 'Go, bind Semjâzâ and his associates who have united themselves with women so as to have defiled themselves with them in all their uncleanness. 12. And when their sons have slain one another, and they have seen the destruction of their beloved ones, bind them fast for seventy generations in the valleys of the earth, till the day of their judgement and of their consummation, till the judgement that is for ever and ever is consummated."_

I hope this little note makes this chapter make a little more sense.


	7. Chapter 7

Last part I'm afraid for all of you that have followed this story and I know this is just a bit tagged on to fix the boys a little.

So thanks to all of you who read and reviewed - sorry if I didn't get back to you your thoughts and everything we really appreciated.

You never know one day when I actually finish all the other stories I have to finish I might actually get around to writing a sequal but that maybe a long way off.

* * *

A couple of months later Sam was finally finishing up the repairs on the Impala.

"I still can't believe I'm seeing this," Dean said as he watched his brother work.

"I'm almost done," Sam said. "Thanks for letting me finish up what I started, even if you are right about me 'dragging my ass' on the hard stuff."

"Yeah, but I've told you before I am going to check what you been doing to her," Dean said with a weak smile as Sam wiped his hands.

"Dean…"

"Don't, Sam. I'm grateful you found me, can't believe they let me wander over the Earth after I fell, so thanks - again. And before you start, I don't think I can take you apologising to me for everything - again!"

"But Dean…," Sam started to say. "You got to be pissed still."

"I'm tired, Sam," Dean said. "I know it's taken some time but let me get used to being really me, before we do this."

Sam nodded. "Yeah."

"But I can say it's good to see you're okay, even if you did have to deal with me being a self-righteous bastard," Dean said.

"I tried to kill you," Sam said.

Dean grinned, "Well, ain't like either one of us hadn't done that before, and I kind of deserved it – shouldn't have called you that, not then, not when you needed me to listen."

"No, you were right to say what you did, I deserved it, deserve a whole lot more," Sam said. "In fact, you should have killed me in that room, not tried to talk. You could have stopped all of it if you had."

"Ruby would have gone another route to break the seal, Lilith would still have ended up dead and I'd… well, I'm glad I didn't. It's what they wanted – us to go Cain and Abel on each other's asses," Dean sniffed.

Sam nodded, "Yeah, it was, wasn't it?"

"How does it feel? You know without any of that crap in you?"

"Weird," Sam said. "Even got the stuff the Yellow Eyed Demon put in me. I'm only my own type of freak now."

Dean smirked. "That's freak enough for me."

"What about you?" Sam asked. "Any Angel stuff left?"

Dean shrugged. "Don't think so. So we can just be vanilla flavored freaks for a while."

Sam smiled. "I think I could get used to that, but are we sure of this? That they took everything out?"

"I hope so," Dean replied.

"Hope we never have to find out."

"Yeah," Dean said. "Sucks, though. Would have been interesting. I would have beaten your super powered ass down with the mojo I had going on, even without the army at my back."

"Batman to my Superman?"

"Totally, Dude," Dean said with a smile.

"Dean," Sam said tentatively, "You saved my ass."

"Well, story of my life. You would have done the same for me," Dean said. "You did. You came looking for me."

"Cas was the one who told us where to find you and he didn't come until after…"

"You still thought I was alive. You got yourself straight and came for me," Dean said. "I appreciate that."

"You shouldn't." Sam bowed his head avoiding his brother's gaze. "I should have tried to find you sooner."

"Well, I do," Dean replied.

"We should have found you sooner. I should done…"

"Sam, I still need you to kick me up my butt when I do something stupid. Can't see that changing and for that you need to be at the top of your game. You understand me," Dean replied.

"Is there anything I could have done that would have stopped you from doing it?" Sam asked.

"What?"

"You heard me," Sam said. "Would there have been anything I could have done to that would have stopped you from looking out for me?"

Dean shook his head, "Dude, you let out Lucifer. I know it was because part of it was you trying to look out for me, that the bitch manipulated you into thinking killing Lilith would fix everything, but it you let out the devil, Dude. So I think that kind of covers the worse case scenario of shit you could do."

Sam took a breath. "Is there anything that would have stopped you?"

"Well, if your next girlfriend doesn't meet with my approval, then maybe."

"Dean, I'm being serious. Hypothetically, is there something I could do that would stop you helping me?"

"Dude, you haven't been getting cravings to go and suck on some demon have you?" Dean asked. "Sam, you ain't being going out and snacking behind our backs have you?"

"No," Sam said with a shake of his head. "There is nothing demonic behind it."

"What are you saying then?"

"Say I kept something from you, something big, but if I told you someone would get hurt – someone innocent, someone I know that you would never want to be put at risk," Sam said. "What would you want me to do? Would you want me to tell you or would you want me to keep my mouth shut?"

"And this is hypothetical?" Dean asked to which Sam nodded. "And hypothetically me knowing would cause this 'innocent' person to be hurt and I wouldn't want that? And there is nothing demonic about it?"

"Yeah."

"And this is really just hypothetical? Not real and this ain't you just doing that crap you do, so you can spill about something I don't really want to deal with?" Dean asked causing Sam to hesitate for a few seconds before he nodded in reply. Dean scratched his head, thinking for a moment. "Dude, can I just answer that as you are weird."

Sam smiled. "That is what I thought you'd say."

"So you going to finally going to finish up, because once we get my baby back on the road, we got some work to do."

"You don't have to Dean. Demons have been quiet at the moment."

"Other things out there Sam," Dean replied.

"I know and I know I got to get back out there. I got to…I got to make.."

"To do what?" Dean asked

Sam took a breath, "I got to try and make up for what I did, not that it ever really will."

"Not without me, you don't. Who knows what you'd be getting into to?" Dean grinned, "And what else would I be doing?"

Sam nodded stoically, the pain eating him up inside. "Yeah, what else would you be doing?"

* * *

In Wichita, Pete sat in the waiting room as a small redhead screamed in pain in the room that lay through the doors, it had been 12 hours since he and her neighbor had taken her in.

"Who are you waiting on?" Pete asked the strange man who was standing by the notice board.

"Old friend," Castiel said, "Brought in a few hours ago. You?"

"Friend's kid," Pete said. "Her neighbor is in with her now. "

"Not her husband?" Castiel said.

"No… ehm he died. Good guy. Was real excited about this kid. So Anna is kind of a member of the family now," Pete said.

"I'm sure she is lucky to have you looking out for her." Castiel replied.

"Yeah," Pete said as he returned to his vigil.

* * *

Another contraction hit, the doctor said the baby was coming and she had to push.

Anna shook her head and cried saying she wanted Dean, that he should be there as the old lady from next door held her hand saying she knew that he'd have been proud of her at that moment and that Anna hadn't lost him completely.

At 3pm on a warm Friday afternoon Robert John Dean Campbell came screaming into the world, before calming down in the nurse's arms. Staring up at the face of the woman who held him, a small hand clutching at her tunic.

"Already a boob man," the nurse joked as she handed the baby to Anna.

Anna let out a laugh, "Like his father."

She started down at the little face that had already seemed to fall asleep after his exhausting day.

"Hey, my little man. Nice to finally meet you," Anna said as she rocked the little bundle.

"It's just you and me, but your daddy loved you so much and I know he would have wanted to be here," Anna said, her heart heavy, the false memories planted in her mind coming to the fore. "But that's okay; you don't have to worry about that because you've already made him so proud."


End file.
